Bloodlust
by Love's-Sweet-Exile
Summary: A terrible accident leaves Damon with no choice but to change Elena. How will she cope with vampire life? And can Stefan deal with the connection blossoming between her and Damon? Damon/Elena and Stefan/OC. Please R & R-first VD fic!  may turn M later!
1. Chapter 1

**Okay, first VD ff! Bit of a crazy idea so just praying some of you guys read and like!**

**Please review so i know whether to continue it or not!**

**xx Zoo**

A terrible accident means Damon has no choice but to turn Elena. How will she adjust to vampire life? And can Stefan deal with the sudden connection between her and Damon?

Chapter 1

'I still can't believe I let you drive,' Damon rolled his eyes.

'You know full well that I don't trust you,' replied Elena darkly, and she closed her fingers tightly around the steering wheel.

'And _you_ know full well that I'd never do anything to put you in danger,' he smiled, leaning back in his seat and running a hand through his hair.

'You do realise the only reason that you're here is because Stefan said I shouldn't go anywhere on my own. And... and I need some _space_ away from him. Since Klaus turned up he's super-protecto guy!'

'I get it,' Damon laughed. He proceeded to slump even further back and pull a bottle of single-malt from his bag. 'Unfortunately the driver doesn't get to drink,' he grinned, taking a long, slow gulp from the dusted glass. The rush pounded through his veins as usual when he glanced sideways at her, letting his eyes do the familiar split-second run from her large dark eyes, down the straight bridge of her nose, and around those perfectly-shaped pink lips.

He didn't even waver as the car span backwards and g-force threw Elena's head to the dashboard with an echoing crack.

'_Shit_!' Damon shouted as steam flooded from the bonnet of the car and the unmistakable crackling of fire filled the air. '_Elena_?' he reached across and lifted her head gently from the wheel. 'ELENA?' blood was running through his fingers from the huge cut across her forehead. 'No...no...oh God no... Elena wake _up_.' He pulled her across the seat and kicked the car door straight off its hinges.

Glass and steel smashed against his back as the car exploded seconds after they'd left it. Squinting through the hazy smoke, Damon laid her down on the tarmac road, ignoring the horrified shouts of the family in the other car, who were closing in on them like vultures.

'No, _NO_! Get the hell _away_ from me,' he sobbed, shaking Elena's shoulders. 'No...Elena...don't be dead...' he pressed his fingers to her throat, and it was only his vampire senses that picked up on the weakest possible flutters of a pulse. He'd killed enough people to know when it was too far. He knew he had just seconds to decide.

There was a sharp intake of breath from the other driver and his family as Damon pressed his nail to his wrist and slashed a deep slit down his arm. He slipped his hand around the back of her head as gently as he could and lifted it to his arm, so that her lips just brushed the now cascading blood.

'What the _hell_ are you doing?'

The voice echoed around Damon's ears, but he was focused on waiting for that tiny movement in her throat that would tell him she was drinking. That near imperceptible second where he'd know she'd live... 'It's okay,' he whispered soothingly, resting her head across his knees and brushing the blood soaked hair from her face. 'You're gonna be fine...' he turned his head slowly to face the others – a male driver, his wife and their two children, all staring in frozen horror.

He stood, lifting Elena with him and walking straight over. 'You're going to get back in the car... forgot what you saw here and drive home...' he glanced over at the wreckage of their car, 'you hit a tree and crushed the bonnet... it was an – an accident,' his voice broke, and he compelled each of them, shaking more and more with every word.

They turned away in perfect unison and drove back down the road, leaving Damon to slide to the floor as the rain started to fall. He'd never forget that rain, not for the rest of his life. It was heavy, hammering down on his back like the shards of glass being shot into the air from tiny explosions on the burnt out car.

He didn't even think to phone Stefan, he just dragged Elena to the side of the road and leant back against the stone wall there. He felt like he'd just run a marathon, and he wished - god how he wished – that he could find that switch to turn off his emotions, but his mind had slid into a black pool of despair and he couldn't find it.

He wasn't sure how long he sat there, holding Elena's fragile body against his chest. He'd told himself not to be selfish... not to love her. Well that hadn't lasted long.

'_Damon_,' a voice whispered groggily, and he almost jumped out of his skin as he jerked back to reality, glancing up at the darkening sky and then down at Elena, who was looking up at him through a little bloodshot eyes. 'Damon what happened?'

'It's okay...Elena...you're gonna be fine...'

She looked slowly down at the dried blood on his arm and touched her finger to it. 'No... you didn't...'

'You need to kill someone, Elena,' he looked her directly in the eyes, 'or you will die.'

#

Damon helped Elena home, her arm around his shoulder and her breaths short and sharp. 'How long have I got...?' she coughed.

'You say that like you're going to die,' he couldn't stop the hot rush through him as she closed her fingers on his arm.

'I won't...kill anyone... hey, wait! My house is... is that way...'

'Yeah, Elena, where Jeremy and Jenna are... if you're gonna kill anyone it's _not_ gonna be them!'

'I can smell the blood Damon!' she cried, 'I don't want to be a vampire...please Damon...'

'C'mon,' he ignored her, moving at a pace slightly faster than a humans and darting smoothly down the side roads leading to the old boarding house. 'We're gonna sort this out, and _everything_ is going to be fine, I swear.'

'I told you I don't trust you...' she laughed weakly.

'Prepare to watch me get my head torn off,' Damon grimaced as he kicked open the front door and lifted Elena bridal-style over the threshold. She went to push his chest but still felt to dreary, though the blood was pounding in her veins like never before. So she let herself laugh with a sigh, before looking up and seeing Stefan framed in the hallway, a look on his face that informed Damon he was just about to die.

**Sooo, what do you guys think?**


	2. Chapter 2

**Sound the bells, I actually updated.**

**I have been ill. Very.**

**And I got a computer virus.**

**But it is here now, so be _happy_!**

**I was reminded by an out-of-the-blue-review.**

**They give me a kick up the ass.**

**Hope you enjoy!**

**xx**

**(I'd also forgotten that one of the actual VD books is called Bloodlust. Oh well...I don't own anything...)**

Chapter 2

'Even now you're a vampire, you're so fragile,' Damon murmured, tracing his finger down Elena's cheek.

'I'm not,' she smiled back, stepping closer to him and resting her head on his chest; he felt two delicate tears against his thin shirt. 'I'm strong now. As strong as you.'

'Oh yeah?' he grinned, kissing the top of her head and wrapping his arms slowly but surely around her tiny frame. She fit there like a puzzle piece – a lost one that he'd been searching for, for many months while the puzzle itself laid unfinished. 'I'd like to see you try and take me on,' he said gently with a soft laugh.

'How about you take _me_ on?' she laughed against his chest.

'Elena... we can't be together like this... it's not fair, not fair on Stefan.'

'Forget Stefan. It's just you and me, Damon. When you fall in love the normal rules don't apply any more. People get hurt, but love is a law unto itself.'

Damon jerked awake violently, blinking as Stefan kicked open the door and sat straight down behind his mahogany desk. 'Jesus, brother, I've been through a great trauma.'

Stefan did not smile.

'Is she downstairs?'

'Yeah,' he replied icily. 'Sleeping.'

'You realise that if this doesn't work, she's dead?'

'It will work.'

Damon raised his eyebrows and slumped back into the chair again, wishing he was still peacefully asleep. The notion that Elena might well die was not one he liked to entertain, but as hard as he tried to push it to the back of his mind, all he could see was her face, covered in blood as she choked and died.

He stood very slowly, almost as though he was hoping that Stefan would not see him, but by the time he was at the door Stefan and jumped into his path with a steely look. 'Don't you dare go anywhere near her.'

'You wanna hear something, Stefan? It's something you really _don't_ wanna hear but that I think you should. I saved her _life_. And you wish it had been you in the car with her. I _saved_ her Stefan and you can't deal with it. And that's not my fault.' He pushed past his brother and slammed the heavy door behind him.

Had he saved her life? Or had he ended it?

_It'll never matter, Damon_, he thought darkly. It wouldn't. The fact that he depended on her, that he loved her more than Stefan could ever think of doing; it would _never_ matter. Because she chose _him_.

As he walked slowly down the boarding house stairs, running his fingers down the smooth brass banister and the soft taps of his footsteps echoing deafeningly around his head, there was a thought he couldn't push away. The reason he was dreading seeing her. The reason he was considering turning around and running out of the front door.

As he passed it, every particle of his body ached towards it, but he forced himself to walk on into the drawing room, where Elena was lying on the dark velvet chaise lounge.

She looked like perfection. Her arms were resting on her drawn up black-jeaned legs, crooked a little at the elbows with her slender fingers curled. She looked in peaceful sleep, with her warm-toned hair falling across her face as she mumbled something and shifted. Though her delicate lids guarded her diamond eyes, Damon could see the dark brown irises shining in his mind, looking into his as though they could see exactly what he was thinking – then seeing straight through him the second Stefan entered the room.

There were drops of blood on her dark lips, and a deep gash still ran across her forehead. 'I'd take care of you better than him,' he murmured with a smile as he crouched down beside her and brushed the blood from her lips, 'you might still think I'm a bastard, but I'm not. Not really,' he laughed at his own words.

He didn't smell the blood as he touched his fingers to the wound and pressed the sleeve of his black shirt to it. He didn't choke when it soaked up the blood. He didn't react as he should have.

Because the only thought in his mind was that this might be the last time he saw her alive.

Stefan had no proof that animal blood would have the same effect on the transformation as human blood did. 'I never would have let you risk it,' Damon continued, 'I would have _made_ you drink from a human. Hell I would have taken you to a blood bank if it meant that much to you.' But Stefan had made it pretty clear that interference would leave him dead.

The love of his long life seemed to be breathing slower and slower, but how was he supposed to know if that was her dying or turning? 'God Elena, maybe I should have just let you die. What have I turned you in to?

'I don't want you to end up like I did. Being a vampire is different to being a human. Your emotions... they change. You just get so... so _angry_. I was too weak to handle it, Elena, what if you are too? Not that I think you're weak... I'm just scared...' the comatose girl did nothing in way of reply.

'What am I going to do if you die, Elena? I never got to say goodbye. And there's no point in saying goodbye _now_, is there? I mean you can't hear me. So why am I talking to myself like a psycho? 'Cause that's what I am. Or at least what I was. If you knew some of the things I've done, you'd cut yourself until your blood ran clean of mine. From now on there's always that part of me in you... Jesus, no wonder Stefan hates me... Elena? _Elena_?'

He hadn't noticed her breathing stopping. He'd been too busy ranting to realise her arm had slid from the couch and fallen by her side.

'Elena? Oh God... oh Jesus...' he stood and took two rapid steps back. He needed to call Stefan, but his voice wouldn't work. Nor would his legs, evidentially, as they gave way and he ended up kneeling again. 'Elena?'

He almost fell backwards with shock as she gasped sharply and her eyes flew open.

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	3. Chapter 3

**WOW this chapter is bad, but it's an update :)**

**I've tried rewriting it three times, but i have WRITER'S BLOCK real bad at the min!**

**Don't lose faith, the next chapter will be better i SWEAR**

**PLEASE review and alert and all that. Once again, reviewers recieve previews of the next chapter, and trust me, you don't want to miss it.**

**If you're reading this right now, it means you've maybe forgiven me for being such an evil non-updater. **

**Enjoy, if you can - XxMxX**

**PS: If i slip into first person at any point, I apologise. My new book is written in 1st so it's my current mindset **

Chapter 3

'Elena!' he dived forwards.

'Jesus, Damon, calm down. I'm fine.'

'Whoa!' she was swaying slightly as she sat up, her fingers slipping on the velvet and her breathing shallow. 'I feel like _crap_.'

'Yeah, well, it's part of the change,' Damon smiled, relief flooding through his body as he look at her sparkling eyes; God how he'd thought he'd never see them glitter like that again.

'Am I... am I a vampire? Am I done?' she looked terrified.

'Yeah,' he said in reply, 'yeah. I'm... sorry.'

'Don't be, Damon – you saved my _life_.'

'And now you're undead.'

Elena laughed weakly, and for some reason Damon sensed, for the first time, that she really wanted to reach out and hug him. 'I don't – I don't know what Jeremy and Jenna would have done if I'd died, Damon, you've saved them too. What'll... what'll happen with them? I mean, can I see them? Do I have to _tell_ them?'

'C'mon, you're thirsty,' he ignored her questions, helping her up and supporting her gently, very aware of her arm around his shoulder.

'Thanks for calling me,' Stefan said coldly from the doorway, and Damon rolled his eyes.

'Preoccupied, Stef,' and he was very, very glad to notice that she didn't take her arm from around him. 'I'm getting Elena some more blood.'

'I want to see Jeremy. I can see him right?' she looked straight at Stefan.

'I don't think that's really - '

'Oh get over it, Stefan,' Damon groaned, 'she's not gonna _eat_ her brother. I'm gonna get her some blood from the bank and then we'll go over. I mean, she needs to get cleaned up, she's _covered_ in blood and soot and glass.'

'Yeah, 'cause you crashed her car.'

'_I _was driving, Stefan, Damon had nothing to do with it. But I can't walk into my house looking like this – do you guys have anything?'

'Yeah, I stock miniskirts in all sizes,' Damon heard her hide a laugh.

'Go get her a small shirt. She's not having blood from the bank anyway. She'll go on my diet.'

'Number one – starting to know how the cat's mother felt here. And number _two_, Stefan, you're preaching to the converted, seriously. But I've seen how much weaker you are than Damon because of your diet, and I need to be good and strong and all that for when Katherine turns up. I'm not killing anyone, it's _donated _blood.'

_One nil to Damon_, he thought smugly, but said aloud – 'I'll go try and find you some clothes,' he didn't want to push his luck with Stefan. 'You know where the blood bank is. As do you, Stef. Love you like a brother,' he blew a sarcastic kiss before gliding up the stairs and strolling into Stefan's room.

'What kind of self-respecting male doesn't keep any sexy women's clothes in his room?' he said, as he rifled through his brother's wardrobe. 'Jeez, hasn't Elena ever left anything here?'

Knowing that he was considerably thinner than Stefan, Damon walked back over to his own room and pulled an inoffensive black shirt from one of his drawers. _Nothing about trousers, I'm afraid_, he said to himself internally, darting into the bathroom and snatching a towel from the rack. He ran it under the hot tap and checked that the moonstone was in its home before hurrying back down the stairs, to find Elena and Stefan already embracing in the hall.

'Please, God, my eyes are bleeding,' Damon muttered darkly, throwing the shirt at Stefan and pulling Elena away. '_Here_,' the wound on her forehead had healed, but he wiped away the dried blood, and her skin looked a tone lighter when he had finished.

All of the blemishes, too, had vanished, and her skin was smooth and perfect. Much as it was the last thing he wanted to think about, Damon couldn't help but notice that she was now completely and utterly identical to Katherine. He would've said that there was no difference between them before, but now he could remember differences so subtle and slight that he'd never have noticed if he hadn't seen her now.

He ran his fingers roughly through her hair, flattening it out, but she said, 'OW!' loudly and he flinched away. Stefan started forwards, muttering about him being overly and unnecessarily rough with her, but she ripped the chain from around her neck and held it up. 'My necklace just started _burning_!'

'Vervain!' Damon took it from her and tossed it onto the mantelpiece.

'C'mon, let's go,' Stefan glared at Damon, as though it was somehow his fault.

#

'_ELENA_!' Damon shouted.

'What _happened_?' Stefan yelled at him, 'I left you alone for five minutes to go check if Jenna was home, and suddenly she's _gone_!'

'Some kid walked past and fell over, and she smelt the blood and bolted!'

'You're _crap_, Damon, you know.'

'_HOW _is this my fault?'

'Where you go, Damon, things screw up!'

'Shouldn't we be concentrating on finding her?' Damon had to admit he'd hit a nerve. How many times had he heard it "_where you go, people die_"... 'you know what, I've _had_ it with you!' he shouted after Stefan, who was running into the Mystic Falls woods. '_HAD IT_!'

Determined to find Elena first, he sprinted off, trusting that his sense of smell was much improved by his diet. He knew that the scent of her blood was just lingering on her jeans.

It wasn't until he burst into a clearing – not far, he thought, from the Lockwood mansion – that he found her, curled up on the grass and crying softly. Thanking God that there was still time to get her inside before the sun came up, Damon stepped over with unusual tentativeness.

'Damon, what did I do?' Elena stammered.

'Nothing, Elena, _nothing_ okay? It's _fine_? You just freaked when you smelt the blood.'

'I don't want to hurt people! Please help me, I can't hurt anyone!'

'It's gonna be _fine_,' Damon cupped her neck in his hands, tuning her head to look at him. 'You're a vampire now... doesn't mean you're a monster. It doesn't mean you're going to kill people – become a killer. Just 'cause I did doesn't mean you're going to.' He pulled her to him, and there was a slight jump in his veins when she didn't push him away, instead letting him hold her for the first time.

'Am I interrupting?' Stefan's cold voice asked from the surrounding trees.

'Elena got into a... situation,' Damon said disjointedly, turning his lips up in a very weak attempt at a smile. 'I think I can handle it.'

'Really? You suddenly seem to be handling a _lot_,' a muscle was working in his jaw, and he had crossed the clearing in a second, pulling Elena away from Damon, and leaving his brother resisting the urge to take a swing at him.

It wasn't an urge he had to resist for long, as Stefan stepped threateningly close to him, 'if you think, that half a pint of your blood in her veins changes things, then you need to get it in your freakin' head – it's _me_. It's always going to be me.'

And Damon hit him with a deafening crack. Elena jumped in between them, taking advantage of her new found strength, but Stefan was determined to wipe the arrogant smirk off his older brother's face. Because in Damon's mind, it was now two nil.

**Okaay... please no real flames, I know it wasn't very good :(**

**But all the same, previews and Delena love for all those who revieewwww!**

**Next update will be sooner I swear. **


	4. Chapter 4

**I lied. I said I would update quickly. I'm a liar.**

**But alas, i hope you can find it your hearts to forgive me.**

**Haven't seen VD in _ages _so i have no idea where this is on the timeline, so just bear with me until I regain some sort of control over the story.**

**I actually like this chapter, which is a rarity, so I hope that you guys like it too!**

**XxMxX**

Chapter 4

Damon pushed past the hugging couple irritably, hammering on Elena's front door. Every time that he seemed to get remotely close to her, Stefan would suddenly be on top again and he'd have to walk moodily behind them.

'Jeremy!' He shouted through the letterbox.

The door opened, and Jeremy leant against the frame, looking first at Damon, then at Stefan, then at Elena. 'You're back then,' he said coolly to Stefan. 'I assumed after you turned around at the front door and disappeared that you weren't coming back.'

'Sorry, Jeremy, but we have a pretty big problem.'

'Is she okay?' he nodded at Elena.

'Standing right here, Jer'!'

Damon didn't wait for an invitation, clearly sick of the small talk, and strolled inside, taking care to turn back around and smile at the two of them still outside. 'You might want to invite her in.' If it was one thing that Damon had always liked about himself, it was his talent for inciting an atmosphere like no other.

Jeremy looked at him with ice cold eyes, but Damon could see the fear that had been roused in them.

'I can explain,' Stefan said slowly.

Jeremy ignored him, turning around as Alaric appeared out of the living room. 'Do I hear a commotion?'

'Elena's a vampire,' Damon said quickly, before Stefan could begin to think of anything. 'Just thought I'd drop that bombshell now rather than wait half an hour while Stefan tries to sugar-coat it.'

There was a long pause. 'Have you invited her in?' he asked.

'No,' Jeremy shrugged, 'but I'm sort of guessing that would be the next step.'

'I don't know if there is some sort of strange mental debate going on here, but it's not like I'm going to turn evil and kill you guys, I mean seriously, just invite me in,' there was something about the way that Elena said it that made Damon think for a second; _what if she did go evil? _He remembered what had happened with Vicki Donovan, and tried to push those kinds of thoughts out of his mind.

'Of course, I – come in,' Jeremy swallowed, standing out of the way as Elena stepped inside. Damon thought he saw her breathe in a little too deeply as she walked past the two humans in the house.

#

'You think you know someone, and then…' Jeremy looked down at his fingers.

'Look, I'm no therapist, so I'm not going to sit here and tell you that everything is going to be alright,' one-on-one conversations like this were not ones that Damon enjoyed finding himself in. 'But Elena hasn't changed. Not inside, I mean. Look at Caroline, she's still the same right? And Bonnie's a witch and you don't look at her any differently. Elena is still Elena.'

'Except now every time she sees me she's going to want to rip my throat out.'

'Where's Jenna?' Damon didn't want to address that particular topic of conversation.

Jeremy shrugged. 'I don't know, she went out with some guy that she met in one of her lectures.'

Confused, Damon raised his eyebrows. 'Aren't she and Alaric…?'

'I don't think that the guy she met is really _that_ kind of thing, I think she genuinely just wanted to talk to him about her dissertation.'

Much as Damon hated to get himself embroiled in pointless human gossip, he wanted to ask more. Realising that this probably wasn't the subject that Jeremy would want to talk about right now, he cleared his throat and stood up. 'I'm gonna go and see how she's doing.'

He took the stairs two at a time, pushing open Elena's bedroom door and finding her sat on her bed, mobile in her hand and looking much better than she had half an hour ago.

She was wearing her own blue tank top with a black skirt and white jacket, and her hair was clean and free from the blood of earlier. Once again he was struck by how completely and utterly she looked like Katherine. In fact, the way that she smiled when she saw him was disconcerting – it could've been a scene from a hundred years ago.

'I can't seem to bring myself to call Bonnie,' she waved her mobile at him, 'one click on speed-dial away but I'm too scared to just press a button. Stefan went outside to call Caroline.'

'Well you don't have to call Bonnie right now – just call her when you feel like you're ready.'

'She's gonna be angry enough as it is – I don't want her to be the last person in Mystic Falls to find out!'

'Elena, you need to stop being so scared that everyone is going to be angry with you!' Damon rolled his eyes. 'If they're going to be angry with anyone then it should be me, I mean I'm the one who changed you.'

'You're the one who saved my life,' she smiled at him.

'Anyone else would've done the same in the situation. It was an easy choice.'

'You know what the scary thing is? I don't think that Stefan would've changed me. I think he would've let me die.'

'That's ridiculous, Elena,' much as it pained Damon to say it, he knew he couldn't let her go on thinking that Stefan was the bad guy, 'he would change you if it was a choice between that and death. I know him well enough to know that.'

'Then why hasn't he changed me all this time that Klaus has been after me? I could've died any of these past few weeks. At least you considered it.'

'What I did to you was unforgiveable,' despite himself, he raised a hand and ran his fingers through her hair. 'And yet you still forgave me.'

'I don't think I can stay angry with you for that long,' she bit her lip. 'You know, you said to me once… or maybe it was Stefan… that once you become a vampire, everything is heightened. Not just your senses, but your emotions too. I'm realising things about how I feel that I never even noticed when I was a human.'

'And what sort of things would those be?'

She drew away from him, 'just stuff. I never knew that losing my parents could hurt this much, I didn't realise that it could get any worse.'

Well that hadn't been what Damon had been expecting. He glanced up and saw that Stefan was standing in the doorway. How long had he been watching them? And at one point had Elena realised he was there, making her break off the moment with Damon?

'Caroline wasn't answering her phone,' he said coldly. 'We should probably pack you a bag to take back to the house.'

'Whoa, I can't stay here?'

'Yeah, Stefan, surely it would be best if she could stay with her _family_.'

'Until she gets hungry at one in the morning and decides to _kill_ one of them.'

'_Excuse me_?' she gaped at him. 'I might be a vampire, but I'm not a freaking _idiot_! I'm not going to kill Jeremy, or Jenna or Alaric! I can't believe you even _consider_ that!'

'Fine, you know what, make the decision with _Damon_, since you two seem to have gotten so close over the last few hours!'

And then he vanished.

'_Stefan_!' she shouted after him.

'Let him go,' Damon caught her arm before she could move, 'I know my brother, he'll run out of steam in a couple of hours.'

'God, I've been a vampire for all of two hours and I'm already ruining everything!'

'You aren't ruining anything!'

'I'm pushing Stefan away, and I don't _want_ to, I _love_ him! And I saw the look on Jeremy's face when he saw me – I'm not his sister anymore, I'm just another vampire.'

'Don't talk like that!' Damon found himself almost shouting. 'You haven't done anything wrong, and you're the exact same Elena that you were before. So maybe people are going to look at you a bit differently, but not Caroline and Bonnie, and _definitely_ not me!'

'Stefan does,' there were tears in her eyes. 'He never wanted me to be like this – this is like his worst nightmare! He pretended everything was alright back at the boarding house, but it took five minutes for the cracks to start to show.'

'Well then screw Stefan,' how much Damon had always wanted to say those words to her. 'If he isn't going to accept you for who you are now, then you sure as hell don't need to take crap from him.'

Elena wiped her eyes angrily. 'You really think he'll come around?'

'I _know_ he will,' Damon sighed, 'my brother's lost too much to throw away the best thing that's ever happened to him.'

It was a fact that he knew he had to accept. Even now that everything had changed, he still had absolutely no chance of Elena ever loving him. Just like Katherine had never loved him like she loved Stefan – he was starting to grow used to the pattern.

**As usual, previews of the next chapter will be sent to all reviewers who want them, and yes, there is lots of lovely Delena coming :P**

**PLEASE review, the more I get, the more I am reminded I do at some point have to update. Reviews make me stupidly happy, they are like cotton candy.**


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